1492 eBook

We took our supper together in a wide, low room, looking
out upon the road. Don Francisco and Juan Lepe
talked and the young man listened. Juan Lepe
talked but his eyes truly were for this young man.
It was not that he was of a striking aspect and better
than handsome, though he was all that—­but
I do not know—­it was the future in his
countenance! His father addressed him as Bartolome.
Once he said, “When my son was at the University
at Salamanca,” and again, “My son will
go out with Don Nicholas de Ovando.” Juan
Lepe, sitting in a brown study, roused at that.
“If you go, senor, you will find good memories
around the name of Las Casas.”

The young man said, “I will strive in no way
to darken them, senor.”

He might be a year or two the younger side of thirty.
The father, it was evident, had great pride in him,
and presently having sent him on some errand—­sending
him, I thought, in order to be able to speak of him—­told
me that he was very learned, a licentiate, having
mastered law, theology and philosophy. He himself
would not return to Hispaniola, but Bartolome wished
to go. He sighed, “I do not know.
Something makes me consent,” and went on to
enlist Doctor Juan Lepe’s care if in the island
ever arose any chance to aid—­

The son returned. There was something—­Juan
Lepe knew it—­something in the future.

Later, Don Francisco having gone to bed, the young
man and I talked. I liked him extraordinarily.
I was not far from twice his age, as little man counts
age. But he had soul and mind, and while these
count age it is not in the short, earthly way.
He asked me about the Indians, and again and again
we came back to that, pacing up and down in the moonlight
before the Spanish inn.

The next morning parting. They were going to
Cordova,
I to the sea.

The doves flew over the cloister of La Rabida.
The bells rang; in the small white church sang the
brothers, then paced to their cells or away to their
work among the vines. Prior had a garden, small,
with a tree in each corner, with a stone bench in
the sun and a stone bench in the shade, and the doves
walked here all day long. And here I found the
Adelantado with Fray Juan Perez.

The Admiral was well?

Aye, well, and next month would come to Seville.
A new
Voyage.

We sat under the grape arbor and he told me much,
the Prior listening for the second time. The
doves cooed and whirred and walked in the sun and
shadow. According to Don Bartholomew, half in
his pack was dark and half was light.

Ovando? We heard again of all that. He was
going
out, Don Nicholas de Ovando, with a great fleet.

The Adelantado possessed a deal of plain, strong sense.
“I do not think that Cristoforo will ever rule
again in Hispaniola! King Ferdinand has his own
measure and goes about to apply it. The Queen
flinches now from decisions. —­Well,
what of it? After all, we were bred to the sea,
I have a notion that his son Diego—­an able
youth—­may yet be Viceroy. He has established
his family, if so be he does not bring down the structure
by obstinating overmuch! He sees that, the Admiral,
and nods his head and steps aside. As for native
pride and its hurt he salves that with great enterprises.
It is his way. Drouth? Frost? Out of
both he rises, green and hopeful as grass in May!”